In recent years, compactness, high output, and high quality have been required in rotary electric machines such as electric motors or generators. With regard to downsizing rotary electric machines of this kind, stator windings that have concentrated windings that are configured by winding conductor wires onto individual stator core teeth have been used with a view to downsizing coil ends, which do not generate effective magnetic flux. However, stators that use stator windings of distributed winding construction that can suppress torque pulsation and increase output are in demand. In addition, demand for induction machines that do not use magnets has also increased due to steep rises in magnet prices, and there is demand for stators that use higher-efficiency distributed winding stator windings.
Now, in contrast to concentrated windings, which are configured by winding conductor wires onto individual teeth, windings that are configured by winding conductor wires into pairs of slots that are separated by greater than or equal to two slots are designated “distributed windings”. In other words, distributed windings are configured such that a conductor wire that extends outward from one slot is wound around a slot pair for a plurality of turns so as to span two or more consecutive teeth and enter another slot.
In conventional rotary electric machines such as that described in Patent Literature 1, winding coils that are formed into a coil shape by winding a rectangular conductor wire a plurality of times, also known as “hexagonal coils”, are housed in respective pairs of slots that are separated by a predetermined number of slots, and predetermined hexagonal coils are connected by crossover wires that are disposed outside coil end groups to constitute a distributed winding stator winding.